


Over the Hills

by Songspinner



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Captivity, Crimes & Criminals, M/M, also Gilbert is here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 11:54:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25969261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Songspinner/pseuds/Songspinner
Summary: When Claude is convicted of crimes against the Church that he didn't commit, things get messy when his alibi is that he was with his secret royal lover at the time...
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 4
Kudos: 42





	Over the Hills

**Author's Note:**

> This story is based loosely on the song "Over the Hills and Far Away."
> 
> Posted for Dimiclaude Birthday Week 2020, day 1: Ocean

Urgent pounding on his door jolts Claude from sleep. “Your Grace!” a voice hisses from the other side. “Your Grace, wake up!”

“I’m awake,” he calls, hoarse. It’s half a lie, but he picks his head up from--oh, he fell asleep at his desk again. A twinge in his neck has him wincing, but he goes to the door to see one of the staff, staring at him with wide eyes. “What’s the matter, Jeannette?”

“Your Grace, the...the Knights of Seiros are here to see you.” It sounds like a plea.

Claude’s brow furrows. It’s rare to see the knights here in Leicester. Of the three powers in Fódlan, the Alliance is least likely to call upon them--the Eastern Church is weak and largely irrelevant. “About what?”

“They…” Jeannette bites her lip. “They say you’re under arrest for the theft of rare holy relics.”

_ “What?” _ He’s certainly wide awake  _ now _ .

“They demand you come out immediately, or they’ll storm the manor. Please, Your Grace, I’m sorry--”

Claude shakes his head and lays a calming hand on her shoulder. “I’m not one to shoot the messenger, Jeannette, it’s okay. Thank you for telling me. Go let them know I’ll be right there.” She nods and dashes off down the corridor, leaving Claude to weigh his options. He could climb out the window, whistle for his wyvern, and be far from Derdriu before the knights even realized he was gone. But that would only serve to confirm their belief in his guilt, and convince the people of it, too. And he isn’t finished yet here in Fódlan. He still has work to do, he can’t just...leave. Not yet. Too many people are counting on him.

So it’s the usual plan B, then: talk his way out of it. The Knights of Seiros are predictable, he thinks--that’s an advantage for him, certainly. And he has a few allies among them still, from his days at the academy; Catherine and Shamir were always fond of him, and Flayn was his classmate...it’ll have to do.

* * *

“Good evening,” Claude calls as he approaches the gates to see a full battalion of knights arrayed before them. Did they really think he might raise arms against them? The stark gaps in his understanding of how the Church thinks have rarely felt so ominous before. “What can I do for--”

“Duke Riegan,” the stern knight at the front of the group interrupts him--is that Gilbert Dominic? This might be bothersome, he’s known for his stubborn implacability. “I'm afraid this is no social call. You’re under arrest for--”

“For some kind of theft, I know, I heard.” Claude’s meaningless smile doesn’t waver. “But I’m sorry to say that I’m stumped. Care to fill me in on what you think I--”

Gilbert doesn’t let him finish  _ this _ sentence either, gesturing to the two knights by his side. They step forward to take Claude firmly by both arms, as though he were already on the verge of fleeing. Well, he is  _ now _ \--or at least, a part of him is, the part that screams at him to run, to hide, to  _ survive at all costs _ . He takes a breath and forces himself to keep calm. No struggling. Not yet.

“You’ll be brought to Garreg Mach for sentencing,” Gilbert goes on blandly. “And we’re well aware of your reputation for... _ trouble _ , Your Grace. Escape attempts on the journey will only serve to make you a fugitive.”

“Trouble? You wound me, Gilbert.” Claude’s heart and mind both race, but you wouldn’t know it to look at him. “Have you forgotten everything I’ve done for the Church and for Fódlan?”

Gilbert ignores him, nodding to another one of his men, who produces a set of iron shackles and binds Claude’s wrists behind him. His breaths are coming more shallowly and his smile has all but vanished, now.  _ There’s still time, _ he tells himself. The journey to the monastery takes a few days, and once he gets there, he can appeal to people more sympathetic than Sir Dominic. “Please don’t make this any harder on yourself or us than it has to be, Your Grace.”

Better to go along quietly for now, Claude thinks, though it feels like shameful defeat. “I wouldn’t dream of it,” he says. His only response is to get searched by one of his captors, who confiscates both of his hidden daggers, and then bundled into a coach where the knight connects his shackles to a chain bolted to the floor. That’s...discouraging. And of course, his company for the trip is none other than Gilbert himself, so the thought that he might finagle something on the way to Garreg Mach dies on the vine as the clip-clop of horses starts up and the coach trundles on its way.

Still, he only waits until Gilbert dozes off in his seat before testing the limits of his mobility. There isn’t much slack in the chain, just enough that he can stretch out on the seat--presumably to sleep, although he has no intention of doing that anytime soon. But the chain linking the two cuffs together is much shorter than usual, making it both uncomfortable and impossible to loop under his feet to get his hands in front of him. His reputation, indeed…

* * *

The trip is, unfortunately, uneventful, much as Claude would have liked to instigate an event or two. They only let him out of the coach twice a day, briefly, for calls of nature. They choose to put him through the humiliation of feeding him by hand rather than free one of his hands to let him do it himself. Occasionally, he thinks, being known as a master schemer is more inconvenient than it’s worth. He tries to engage them in disarming conversation, but they were probably warned about his renowned silver tongue, too, because he might as well be talking to a pile of bricks for all the response he gets.

By the time the coach pulls into the stables at Garreg Mach, Claude’s arms ache and a spike of nerves is making him feel vaguely nauseous. The nostalgia of the place does nothing to reassure him as they pull him from the coach and guide him by the elbows to the Archbishop’s chamber. The Archbishop isn’t in it, of course, missing as she is. Instead he’s thoroughly unsurprised to see Seteth staring him down.

Claude puts on a friendly smile. “Seteth! Long time no see. I’d shake your hand, but…” He shrugs, tugging at the shackles uselessly.

“I’m sure,” Seteth replies, dry. He never was one for playing along with Claude’s banter. “I presume you know why you’re here, Duke Riegan?”

“Not really,” Claude says. “All I know is that someone apparently thinks I’ve stolen something from the Church. Other than that, I’m in the dark. I haven’t even been anywhere near a Church facility in almost a year.”

“Mm.” Seteth sighs. “I should have known you, of all people, would make this difficult. Where were you on the 29th of Harpstring Moon? I’m told you left Leicester for a few days on...personal business.”

_ Oh, shit. _ “That’s the thing about personal business, Seteth,” he says, flippant. “It’s personal.”

It is, in fact,  _ highly _ personal. Because on the 29th of Harpstring Moon, Claude was with Dimitri. And no one can know that, for both of their sakes.

Seteth rubs his temples with two fingers. “Very well. In that case, you’ll await trial in the dungeons and we’ll send a messenger to Derdriu to inform the other Roundtable lords that you’ll be...indisposed, for the time being. Is there anyone else you’d like us to contact?”

He desperately wants to say  _ the king of Faerghus _ , but he doesn’t. “No one springs to mind.”

“Then I bid you good day, Duke Riegan.”

Claude smiles. “No, you don’t. See you around, Seteth.”

* * *

Seteth watches the knights lead the sovereign duke of the Alliance out of the room in chains and sighs deeply. He can think of worse people to have betrayed the Church, and really, this isn’t even all that surprising. Claude was always poking his nose where it didn’t belong, asking questions he shouldn’t have been asking, sneaking banned books back to his dorm to read them as though he had never heard of the concept of  _ banning _ anything before. The most Seteth can muster is an annoyed disappointment. For all of Claude’s many frustrating qualities, he’s a savvy leader who somehow manages not to incite war just by opening his mouth--in fact, nowadays it seems like the Alliance is the  _ only _ place left in Fódlan vying for peace. But--

A door opening behind him interrupts his thoughts. He turns. “Ah, Flayn. Did you need so--”

“This is not right.” She marches up to him and jabs him hard with a finger. “It is not right and you know it! You know that Claude would never do such a thing, and--”

A familiar stormcloud settles over Seteth’s face. “In fact, I know no such thing. He has always been a bit of a...delinquent, ever since his student days. I--”

“ _ Delinquent? _ ” Her offended look takes him aback. She’s acting like he’s calling  _ her _ a delinquent! What on earth-- “He was my house leader, and my  _ friend _ . He is a good man, and he is our ally!”

Ah. This again. Flayn counts so many people as friends that Seteth is beginning to think perhaps she’s unable to tell the difference between those with good intent and those with ill. “Be that as it may, Flayn, the evidence clearly points to his guilt in this matter.”

Her eyes narrow. “Do you not think it possible that this evidence has been falsified to fulfill someone’s cruel agenda? And should we not investigate further to ensure that an innocent man does not take the blame?”

“There is no time for such investigations. Rhea is still missing and we cannot spare the knights to hare off on a wild goose chase that no doubt Claude von Riegan would find a way to thwart, regardless. He is as clever as he is unruly. We must take no chances with the likes of him.”

Flayn’s hands clench into fists at her sides. “Listen to yourself, Brother! You speak of him as though he is some manner of...of villain! The Golden Deer were once as close to me as family. Have you not even the heart to spare him the benefit of the doubt, for just a little while?”

Seteth’s lips press together into a thin line. He might have allowed such a second chance, once, before his only remaining sibling was spirited away from what should have been an impossible battlefield. Before his daughter was kidnapped and nearly killed by someone he allowed to  _ teach _ under their very roof. Before Tomas, before Monica. Before Jeralt. But now? No, there can be no second chances.

“I cannot,” he says, clipped and final. “ _ I _ am your family, Flayn, and so is Rhea. We are the ones who protect you, and now it is our job--yours and mine--to protect her. I will hear no more of this matter.” He turns on his heel and leaves the room before he begins to second-guess himself under the scrutiny of that hurt, shocked look in her eyes.

“Brother--!” The door closes behind him, and that is that.

* * *

Three days later, Claude’s still sitting on the cold, stone floor in the dungeons under the monastery, huddled under a blanket they took pity on him enough to bring him on the first night when he was shaking like a leaf in the chill. His hands are in front of him now, but still shackled close together, and once again tethered to the floor by a length of chain that keeps him from reaching the cell bars. Which, he has to admit, is smart of them, but not terribly convenient for  _ him _ .

The relative silence and the sheer  _ boredom _ are driving him batty already. He exhausted all the ideas he had for trying to escape, or at the very least for freeing his hands, on day one; none of them worked. He pestered the guards until they consented to bring him some books from the library, at least, but there’s only so much reading in a dim and windowless dungeon one can do before the eye strain and monotony get old. Which is kind of funny, he thinks, since he used to spend hours and hours reading in that library by candlelight without issue. But then, he was seventeen at the time and doing it willingly.

So he’s grateful for the commotion on this third day, shouting and heavy armored footsteps that swiftly approach from the direction of the stairs. He doesn’t bother standing yet, though, not until--

_ “Claude!” _ Oh, gods, is he glad to hear that voice.

“Dimitri?!”  _ Now _ Claude’s scrambling to his feet and hurrying toward the bars, though the chain goes taut before he quite gets there. “What are you doing here?”

And sure enough, there he is, tall and handsome and dressed in his full royal regalia, massive cape billowing behind him as he rushes to grab the bars. “What do you  _ think _ I’m doing here? Claude…” One blue eye full of concern looks him up and down, takes in his rumpled state and restraints; and when he sees that Claude can’t reach him, his face falls into a despairing scowl. “I heard their baseless accusations,” he spits. “Of all the foolish, monstrous  _ lies _ \-- But I will not allow it.” Dimitri slides a hand between the bars and reaches for him, arms long enough for his fingers to brush the duke’s face. “I swear to you, I won’t.”

Claude leans into that warm touch as best he can. “...thank you, Dima,” he whispers, eyes flicking toward the other end of the hall. He can’t see the guards, but he doesn’t know how close they are.

Dimitri’s clear frustration with being unable to take Claude into his arms grows overpowering enough that he growls with it, and for a second Claude thinks he might just wrench the bars apart with his bare hands right then and there. Instead, he marches back out of Claude’s sight, only to bark a terse command to give him the keys to the cell and leave them alone. They protest, but they don’t have the courage to defy the king of Faerghus, and soon Claude hears the jangling of keys and several pairs of retreating footsteps before Dimitri hurries back into view and his clumsy gauntlets fumble with the keys in his haste to get the door open.

Claude might ordinarily try to calm him, reassure him, to ease his mind enough that he can focus on his task more clearly. This time, he stays silent, his heart ready to hammer out of his chest with impatience, with  _ need _ . Finally, the key slides home and the door creaks open, and Dimitri leaves the entire key ring dangling there as he sweeps into the cell and gathers Claude into his arms, squeezing as tightly as he dares.

Claude’s breath leaves him in a deep sigh of relief. He wouldn’t admit aloud to just how much better he feels with just this, the king’s warmth enveloping him, his sturdy arms holding him close, his lips peppering his face with the lightest, quietest kisses. This is dangerous, Claude knows--the guards could change their minds and return at any moment, or they might fetch Seteth, who would have no qualms whatsoever about issuing veiled threats even to Faerghus’ king. But Claude can’t bring himself to say so, melting into Dimitri’s embrace as he is. There’s not enough chain between the shackles for him to wrap his arms around his lover like he wants to, so he clutches fistfuls of Dimitri’s cape instead, just to ground himself.

“Gods, it’s good to see you.” Claude manages to find his words, after a time. “Never realized it could get quite this cold here during Garland Moon, even underground.” He grins a little, intending to lighten the mood, but the king takes it completely seriously--Claude can tell by the intensity of the worry in his eye.

“How  _ dare _ they treat you this way,” Dimitri hisses, his gentle hands a stark contrast to the rage simmering in his voice as he coaxes Claude further into the cell to get some more slack in the chain before he sits down and pulls the duke into his lap. “Are you all right, beloved?” he whispers, pulling his cape around to cocoon them both.

“More or less.” Claude won’t claim he’s peachy, but he certainly could be worse off. “Leaning toward ‘more’ now that you’re here. And I can’t really blame them for taking precautions with me--” He lifts his hands, so tightly bound, ruefully. “They know what I’m capable of. It’s flattering, really.”

“Please, Claude, do not  _ jest _ about this.” Dimitri’s clearly seething, but he makes the effort to keep his voice down. “I cannot believe they would stoop so low as to think you some...some lowly thief.  _ You _ .” He shifts them both so they can face each other. “Why do they blame you?”

Claude shakes his head. “Wish I knew, although I have my suspicions.” He levels a serious look at Dimitri. “They claim I did this deed on the 29th of last moon.”

He can see the moment when the date clicks in the king’s mind. Dimitri pales. “While you were in Faerghus…”

“Exactly.” Claude’s had plenty of time to think this through over the last few days. “I would bet my entire inheritance that a certain Alliance count took advantage of my brief vacation to send some of his little minions scurrying onto Church property to spirit away something important and plant evidence against me in the process.”

“ _ Despicable _ . That wicked fiend will burn for this.” A thought occurs to him, then; his brows lift with a sudden, eager hope. “Ah, but proving your innocence is easy enough. I can simply--”

“No, Dima.” Claude’s voice is low and heavy with tension. “You can’t tell them where I was that night.”

“Claude--”

“ _ No. _ ” He holds Dimitri’s gaze firmly, his chains clanking as he moves to grab the king’s arm with both hands. “Promise me you won’t. The scandal would ruin you. You’ve already got rebels and bandits and bitter nobles who would challenge you for the throne in a heartbeat. I’m not going to add to your kingdom’s instability, you’ll have civil war on your hands.”

“So you would allow yourself to be removed from power and imprisoned instead?” His arms tremble around Claude in his effort to rein in his emotions. “Make no mistake, Claude, were you anyone else, the knights would have you executed for such crimes against the Church. Your position is the only thing keeping you from that fate, and even so, they have the authority to hold you as...as long as they want.” The idea clearly hadn’t quite sunk in until now, and Dimitri falters. “They could keep you prisoner for years, Claude.” A thin, shaky whisper. “They could let you rot behind bars, as a--a  _ lesson _ to anyone who would dare defy them…”

“If that’s all they can do to me, I’m not worried,” Claude soothes him. It’s a lie, but only partially; he  _ is _ worried, but all he really needs to do is get a message to Nader and he’ll be freed. Outed and exiled, probably, but sent back to Almyra with little fuss. A last resort, to be sure, but in the long run, an acceptable loss.

But Dimitri looks at him in horror. “Not worried? Don’t you understand? The Church doesn’t take political prisoners, Claude, they...they  _ punish sinners. _ They won’t keep you here at the monastery, or at your Lighthouse in Derdriu, they’ll…” Hushed. “They’ll lock you away somewhere hidden, with no visitors, no messengers, no mercy. You’ll vanish, and they’ll spin the tale of the last Duke Riegan who defiled the Church and doomed his house in defiance of the Goddess, and they’ll make sure no one can ever dispute it.”

Claude falls silent, manacled hands balling into fists, and he can hear Dimitri’s breath hitching and see tears glimmering in his eye. He reaches up to wipe them gently away. “Dima…”

“Claude, please. Let me prove your innocence.  _ Please. _ I don’t care about the consequences, I--”

“I care,” Claude murmurs. It feels like a stab to his own heart to say so. If the Church really does make him disappear, his dreams are all but dead. And yet...allowing Faerghus to descend into civil war, probably dragging the Alliance into it and giving the Empire the excuse it needs to finally conquer them both once and for all, so many deaths on all sides of a war-torn land...those are tangible, real repercussions, ones he knows how to prevent. His dreams are precious to him, they’re  _ so _ important, but...they’re still a long way off, and even after all the hard work he’s already done, it feels like there’s still so much further to go. And Dimitri isn’t the only one a scandal would ruin; Claude wouldn’t be in much of a position to fulfill his ambitions if it got out, anyway. At least this way, Dimitri can carry the torch.

“I care,” he repeats, “and so will you, when you have time to let it sink in. Besides…” He forces his face to brighten, even knowing it won’t be convincing. “You know me. I  _ deserve  _ my reputation for making trouble. I  _ will _ come back to you, starlight. No matter what happens.”

“Claude--” Dimitri’s voice breaks into a sob. He hugs Claude close to his chest, burying his face in brown curls and letting his tears fall. “I...I couldn’t live with myself, thinking of you like that and...and knowing I could have saved you, and I did nothing…”

“Shhh…” All Claude can do with his hands like this is rest them flat against Dimitri’s chest, and he’s sure they provide no comfort just pressed to his armor, but it’s something. “Dima, it’s okay. It’s okay. I’m here.” It isn’t. It isn’t okay at all. But platitudes are all he has left to offer. Platitudes, and a shoulder for the man he loves to cry on, one last time.

* * *

Claude shivers in the pre-dawn chill and intermittent drizzle, but for once he doesn’t mind the cold so much. Not when this might be one of the last times he gets to feel fresh air on his face for a long time. The thought sickens him, but he stands by his decision to refuse Dimitri’s offer. He’ll think of something. He keeps telling himself that. He  _ will _ think of something--he always does.

He’s not as convinced as he usually is, though, because when Seteth delivered his sentence, it confirmed Dimitri’s worst fear: Claude is to be taken to a remote island prison some miles off Adrestia’s western shore, there to stay indefinitely until the Archbishop is found and can judge the matter for herself. Seteth didn’t offer to let him send a message to anyone. He didn’t offer any apologies, either, and he didn’t listen to Claude’s last-ditch attempt to convince him of the truth. And when Claude pointed out that the Archbishop might well be  _ dead _ , Seteth just walked away.

So here he is, wrists tightly shackled behind his back once again and tethered to a heavy metal mooring ring on a small, private dock, enduring a frigid sea breeze. He’s just beginning to weigh the pros and cons of leaping into the ocean as soon as they move him at the extremely high risk of drowning when he hears light footsteps on the dock behind him. A rush of near-panic lances through him, thinking it must be a knight and not feeling ready at all--but when he turns, it’s Flayn standing there, her hands daintily folded in front of her and her eyes soft and sad. He hasn’t seen Flayn in years. And yet, she looks...exactly the same as she did. He always knew there was something off about her and Seteth--

“Hello, Claude,” she says quietly, her words crisp in the early morning air.

“Hey, Flayn.” He manages a smile for her, though he knows  _ she _ knows it’s insincere. “To what do I owe this honor?”

“What a silly question,” she says, fondly exasperated. “I am here to bid you farewell, of course. We are friends, are we not?”

He wants to say,  _ are we? _ He wants to say, if we were really friends, you could have stood up for me against your father. You could have visited me in the dungeon. You could have done literally anything at all since I was dragged to the monastery for a crime I didn’t commit--and what kind of religion puts people in indefinite solitary confinement just for _ stealing? _ As a nicer alternative to death, no less??

But he does have fond memories of Flayn from their academy days, and he does believe she has good intentions, so instead he says, “Thanks. Hopefully it’s not a  _ permanent _ farewell. I suppose I have even more reasons to root for finding Rhea now, huh?”

“Yes, I suppose that is so.” She holds his gaze steadily. “It would certainly be most upsetting if I never saw her again, or indeed you. I am so very sorry that my brother has done this to you.”

Claude nods slowly, studying her now. Something seems strange about the way she’s looking at him, the way she’s talking. The Flayn he remembers never was much for keeping her feelings and opinions to herself. If she was really that upset about this, if she really thought he might be innocent, she’d be arguing with Seteth and falling over herself to reassure Claude that she would find a way to help… “In a way, I blame myself,” he says in a slightly lighter tone. “If I hadn’t been such a brat back in school, maybe he would have been a little more lenient. Then again, no one’s ever put ‘lenient’ and ‘Seteth’ in the same sentence, brat or not.”

“Claude…” Flayn looks like she wants to say something more serious, but instead she shakes her head and gives him a smile. “I believe you are wonderful just exactly the way you are, and I could not have wished to belong to a better class than yours. If you are a ‘brat,’ then I hope to be one too, someday!” She giggles a bit.

The sentiment catches him off-guard, makes his smile a bit more genuine. “It was a pleasure to be your house leader, Flayn. I’ve missed having your sunny enthusiasm around.”

She steps forward to fling her arms around his middle in a hug, and he’s surprised again--but only for a second. His back is to the water, which means that when she presses something small and metallic into his palm and closes his chilly fingers around it, no one making preparations back on shore notices. Claude fights to keep a grin from his face.  _ You sly little minx! I’ll never underestimate you again. _

“Wait until you see a mountain peak carved into the face of an enormous wolf,” she whispers rapidly to him. “There, you can swim to shore with relative ease and you will have crossed the border into the Kingdom.” Then she gives him one last little squeeze and steps back a few paces. He meets her eyes and nods the tiniest bit to let her know he’s heard--and further, that he understands. She’s given him the literal key to his freedom, yes, but a figurative one, too--fleeing into the ocean off the coast of  _ Faerghus _ means that, according to the Kingdom’s laws, even if the knights follow him into the water and recapture him or some Church lackey catches him once he’s back on land, they have an obligation to bring him before the king before passing further judgment. And it occurs to him that, had she visited him in the dungeon or tried to intervene, Seteth would surely have left her behind for this trip.  _ Clever, Flayn. I promise I’ll find a way to repay you for this. _

“Well,” she says, “I shall be on my way. Your boat will be departing soon.”

He nods. “It was good to see you again, Flayn. Thanks. And if you see King Dimitri, give him my regards, okay?”

“Of course.” Her eyes sparkle. He always suspected that she knew about his secret relationship with Dimitri and kept it quiet for their sake, and the fleeting gleeful look on her face pretty much confirms it. She gives him a bow, and then she’s gone.

This will be a tricky escape to make without getting shot or stabbed, drowning, freezing to death, or getting himself locked up for eternity. But now that he has a plan, he knows he can make it. And then…

Then no one will tear him away from Dimitri’s arms ever again. He swears it.


End file.
